Starting Points: The Persian Gulf

I hope the book helps readers grasp the bigger picture of this extraordinary place. The Gulf is part of a global story that is more than 5000 years old, a story of Africans, South Asians, Arabs, Greeks, Persians, Baluchis, Sufis, Nestorians, Mandaeans and Buddhists. Understanding the diversity of its people, and the long history of mutual interactions reveals that the conflict between Shia/Sunni, Iran and Arabia in the news today was not always the norm. Bridging the Gulf can help us build a bridge at the center of history.—Allen James Fromherz

Horrors of the 21st Century

• Renewable energy systems built on slavery.

The "Sustainable" Slave Economy

“Progress has different meanings for different people… what was progress for white people was enslavement and further degradation for African Americans.”—Prof. Margaret Washington, Cornell University

I am horrified at how many people are lauding the Chinese achievements in photovoltaic and electric vehicles without any commentary on the slave system they are built on. The sustainable energy transition is driving the expansion of the slave system in China, much as the invention of the cotton gin drove the expansion of the slave system in the antebellum United States, and if we don't act now, we are going to end up with a global economy built in part on slavery.

On Criticizing Chinese Slavery

Publicly criticizing slavery in China must be a lot like publicly criticizing the Holodomor and Stalin's purges back in the day. So much of the intelligensia was convinced that the Soviet Union was the hope of the future and actually they were this brutal horror. And now people are convinced China is the hope of the future and they're this slave power.

The Holy Wars of Modern Fascism

The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), which now governs Iran, is led by bellicose fanatics who dream of jihad, not in the sense of a personal struggle against evil, but rather in the sense of conquest. They are likely to fail in their dreams, but they can do a great deal of harm in the failing. But they are not much different from

The Global Trade War Is Here

So, the Iranian government, which is the consolidated result of the most radical elements of Iran, is now apparently planning on tolling all traffic through the Persian Gulf. I expect them to try to strangle the Arab states of the Gulf, the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) states, which they regard as heretics. So long freedom of navigation.

Crunch Time for Renewable Energy Deployment

Trump and Netanyahu’s ill-considered war on Iran has brought us to a situation where 20% of the world’s oil supply is bottled up in the Persian Gulf. If the war continues–and none of the participants show signs of backing down–the price of crude oil is expected to double over time. Other raw materials are bottled up in the Gulf as well, fertilizer, and helium, important for chip manufacture.